Older workers throughout Europe are increasingly expected to participate longer in the labour market. While training appears to increase workers’ employability, prior research indicates that employers are less prone to provide training with increasing age of the workers. In this study, we aim to provide a better understanding of what affects employers’ considerations. We conduct a vignette experiment among Dutch employers to investigate how the government and workers themselves can exert influence on employers’ willingness to provide training. Our analyses show that employers’ provision of training declines with workers’ age, and additionally reveal two mitigating mechanisms. First, government reimbursements appear to work as a buffer: when reimbursements are offered, the decline in employers’ willingness to offer training is less pronounced throughout workers’ careers. Second, workers’ interest in training has a delaying effect: when workers are interested in training, employers’ willingness to provide training remains rather stable until workers are aged about 55, and decreases only afterwards. This contrasts the constant decline with age when workers had no interest in training. Our findings emphasise that employers’ considerations cannot be understood without taking the context into account, because governments and workers can affect employers’ decisions through cost reduction and social exchange relations, respectively. More research is needed to disentangle other possible underlying mechanisms.

The popular media suggest that we are witnessing ‘a fashion for older women’ and that ‘the latest new faces to light up campaigns and covers’ are retirees (The Guardian, 16 September 2012). Do fashion designers know this? On the one hand, Sir Christopher Frayling, former Rector of the Royal College of Art in the United Kingdom, observes that we need a change in mind-set for the art school of the future since design students’ attitudes to designing for older people is that it is really boring (‘Start the Week’, BBC Radio 4, 19 November 2012). On the other hand, the sculptor Antony Gormley states that ‘Art schools are the things that reinforce agency in the world’. This paper emerges out of an ongoing conversation between a group of women friends about how they feel about clothes and the fashion choices on offer to them. The women constitute a sub-group of women in their sixties who grew up in the 1960s, against a background of ‘cultural revolution’ in British fashion that emerged out of the art schools.

Mounting concern about economic preparation for later life combined with a growing number of grandparents providing grandchild care is fuelling increased interest in these topics in Korea. However, few studies have evaluated the relationship between providing care to grandchildren and economic behaviour. Guided by intergenerational exchange theory, this paper analyses the relationships between providing grandchild care and monetary compensation for care, and economic preparation for later life. Data come from a sub-sample of 2,599 grandmothers in the Korean Retirement and Income Study who have a grandchild under the age of ten, 279 of whom report providing regular care to grandchildren. Controlling for age, education, marital status and household income, the average amount of grandchild care provided per week is a significant negative predictor of economic preparation for later life among grandmothers. However, receiving financial compensation for providing grandchild care is not significantly related to economic preparation and did not mediate or moderate the relationship between amount of care provided and economic preparation. The implications of these findings and limitations of this study are also discussed.

During the period of economic and political transformations in Poland, considerable changes occurred in large housing estates, while demographic transformation and housing-stock ageing starting to aggravate social and spatial problems. The serious issue currently dominating such estates concerns the process of natural ageing of the housing stock and residential ageing which is associated with the reduction of residential mobility and demographic ageing of people living in the large housing estates. This paper intends to identify ageing of the estates’ population in the context of the evaluation of residential life quality. The authors concentrated on analysis of 2002 and 2011 statistical data, as well as data collected during their field surveys conducted in 2010–2012. Detailed studies were carried out on seven estates in five cities and towns in Poland (Kraków, Poznań, Tarnów, Żyrardów and Dzierżoniów). To identify the residential standard and quality of life, surveys were conducted on housing estates which allowed the researchers to establish the essential factors which determined the level of satisfaction of older people with regard to their place of residence. The authors also determined the course of changes in the perception of particular aspects of life quality in the process of residents’ ageing in the selected places of residence.

The frail and homebound older adult populations currently experience difficulties accessing primary care in the medical office. Given this fundamental access to care problem, and the questionable care quality that arises when navigating a labyrinthine health-care system, these populations have typically been subject to inadequate primary care. To meet their needs better, growing research stresses the importance of providing comprehensive home-based primary care (HBPC), delivered by an inter-professional team of health-care providers. Family care-givers typically provide the majority of care within the home, yet their perceptions of HBPC remain under-researched. The purpose of this study was to explore unpaid care-givers' perceptions of and experiences with HBPC programmes in Toronto, Canada. We conducted qualitative inductive content analysis, using analytic procedures informed by grounded theory, to discover a number of themes regarding unpaid care-givers' understandings of HBPC. Findings suggest that, compared to the standard office-based care model, HBPC may better support unpaid care-givers, providing them assistance with system navigation and offering them the peace of mind that they are not alone, but have someone to call should the need arise. The implications of this research suggest that HBPC could be a model to help mitigate the discontinuities in care that patients with comorbid chronic conditions and their attendant unpaid care-givers experience when accessing fragmented health, home and social care systems.

This study compared how older people use quality information to choose residential care providers in England, the Netherlands and Spain (Catalonia). The availability of information varies between each country, from detailed inspection and survey information in the Netherlands, through to a lack of publicly available information in Catalonia. We used semi-structured interviews and group workshops with older people, families and professionals to compare experiences of the decision-making process and quality information, and also to explore what quality information might be used in the future. We found that most aspects of the decision-making experience and preferences for future indicators were similar across the three countries. The use of quality information was minimal across all three, even in England and the Netherlands where information was widely available. Differences arose mainly from factors with the supply of care. Older people were most interested in the subjective experiences of other residents and relatives, rather than ‘hard’ objective indicators of aspects such as clinical care. We find that the amount of publicly available quality information does not in itself influence the decisions or the decision-making processes of older people and their carers. To improve the quality of decisions, more effort needs to be taken to increase awareness and to communicate quality in more accessible ways, including significant support from professionals and better design of quality information.

In this study we used individual differences concepts and analyses to examine whether older people achieve different ageing-well states universally or whether there are identifiable key groups that achieve them to different extents. The data used in the modelling were from a prospective 16-year longitudinal study of 1,000 older Australians. We examined predictors of trajectories for ageing well using self-rated health, psychological wellbeing and independence in daily living as joint indicators of ageing well in people aged over 65 years at baseline. We used group-trajectory modelling and multivariate regression to identify characteristics predicting ‘ageing well’. The results showed three distinct and sizeable ageing trajectory groups: (a) ‘stable-good ageing well’ (classified as ageing well in all longitudinal study waves; which was achieved by 30.2% of women and 28.0% of men); (b) ‘initially ageing well then deteriorating’ (50.5% women and 47.6% men); and (c) ‘stable-poor’ (not ageing well in any wave; 19.3% women and 24.4% men). Significant gender differences were found in membership in different ageing-well states. In the stable-poor groups there were 103/533 females which was significantly lower than 114/467 men (z-statistic = −2.6, p = 0.005); women had a ‘zero’ probability of progressing to a better ageing-well classification in later years, whilst males had a one-in-five probability of actually improving. Robust final state outcome predictors at baseline were lower age and fewer medical conditions for both genders; restful sleep and Australian-born for women; and good nutrition, decreased strain, non-smoker and good social support for men. These results support that ageing-well trajectories are influenced by modifiable factors. Findings will assist better targeting of health-promoting activities for older people.

The preference of older people when it comes to ageing in place may be modified by levels of frailty. The aim of this research is to characterise the relationship between frailty and ageing in place, and to identify differences in neighbourhood characteristics supporting ageing in place missed by frail and non-frail older people. A concurrent nested mixed-methods approach was used. For quantitative evaluation, a sample of 945 independently living older adults residing in four districts of Rotterdam were asked to complete a questionnaire in 2013 (response rate = 62%; N = 558). In addition, 32 interviews were conducted with frail and non-frail older people. Results showed that gender, age and especially frailty were related to missed neighbourhood characteristics. People displayed awareness of their increasing frailty and often acknowledged that it increased the need for neighbourhood characteristics enabling them to age in place. We can conclude that dependence on neighbourhoods varies with frailty status. This relationship is dynamic; with frailty, older people become more dependent on their neighbourhood. However, expectations regarding neighbourhood characteristics seem to dissipate with advanced age and increasing frailty.

The Hong Kong population will age rapidly over the next three decades and the entailing problem of old-age poverty will put the Hong Kong government to test. While the government has been using a solely income-based measurement, the main purpose of this study is to assess poverty rates among Hong Kong's older population in terms of both income and consumption-based measurements by using both relative and absolute concepts of poverty. It also examines the association of socio-economic and household characteristics with elder poverty rates. A two-stage stratified sample design was adopted. A total of 4,306 older adults were personally interviewed in their homes, yielding a response rate of 66.2 per cent. This study contributes to the larger study on poverty in Hong Kong by revealing how income and consumption poverty rates may differ among older adults. Older adults who were both income and consumption poor were more likely to be female, widowed, living alone and to have received less than an elementary school-level education. They possessed very few assets and were most likely financially dependent on family support and welfare payments. To understand fully the economic wellbeing of older adults in Hong Kong, this study proposes that joint distribution of income and consumption poverty can better identify and explain the demographic characteristics of the poor older adults. Implications of the study are discussed based on the neo-liberalist approach that the Hong Kong government has taken in welfare provisions.

This paper has re-analysed and compared data between three studies conducted in the United Kingdom and in Sweden (the OPUS ‘Older People's Use of Unfamiliar Space’ study in the United Kingdom and the Swedish studies ‘Let's Go for a Walk’ and ‘Walking in Old Age’) to provide a comprehensive account of the issues facing older people in the outdoor environment. All three studies draw on the ‘fit’ between the person and their environment as a guiding conceptual base – capturing the dynamics of the relationship between older people's personal needs and their wider environmental context. This common conceptual base allowed us to test theory against practice, and to explore the utility of this concept across different geographical contexts. Participatory research was also applied, highlighting the importance of the voice of older people and involving older people in research. The studies also used a mixed-method approach involving both quantitative and qualitative methods. The paper highlights that although not generalisable, you can compare cross-locales and cross-nationally using different methodology; it investigates the challenges of cross-national comparative analysis and draws on findings from the three studies to illustrate the different challenges and solutions and finally looks at lessons that are transferable.

Recent research has shown that divorce reduces the likelihood of home-ownership. Even in later life, ever-divorced men and women display lower home-ownership rates than their married counterparts. There is, however, a lack of knowledge about the consequences of divorce for a majority of divorcees: those who remain in home-ownership or move back into home-ownership after an episode in rental housing. This paper investigates the economic costs of divorce by focusing on the housing wealth of ever-divorced home-owners in later life (age 50 and over), against the background of changing welfare and housing regimes. The empirical analysis is based on data from ten European countries that participated in the third and fourth waves of the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (SHARE 2007/8 and 2011/2). Our analyses support an association between divorce experience and lower housing wealth holdings for men and women who remain in home-ownership after a divorce, or re-enter home-ownership after a spell in rental housing. This means that a divorce has negative housing consequences for a broader range of individuals than thus far assumed. In countries with a dynamic housing market and a deregulated housing finance system, ever-divorced home-owners are worse off than their married counterparts. In these countries, more elderly individuals with a weaker financial situation are able to remain in or regain access to (mortgaged) home-ownership, but at the cost of lower housing equity. Further research should focus on the implications (e.g. for wellbeing, economic position) of such cross-country variations.

Subjective wellbeing was examined amongst 274 adults living with HIV in Australia and the United States of America. There were 164 adults aged 49 years and under, and 110 adults aged 50 years and over. Participants completed a composite questionnaire comprising the Personal Wellbeing Index-Adult (PWI-A), the HIV-Unsupportive Social Interactions Inventory (USII), and demographic and health-related items. Participants reported mean PWI-A scores of 54.7 points, considerably below the Western population normative range of 70–80 points. Older adults reported significantly greater subjective wellbeing compared to younger adults, but still below the normative range. Experiences of unsupportive social interactions were a significant predictor of reduced subjective wellbeing amongst all participants. Qualitative comments provided a greater understanding of the characteristics and psychological devices that enable some older adults to maintain and/or increase subjective wellbeing, even in the face of negative stressors such as unsupportive social interactions. This provides valuable information for service providers and clinicians as HIV increasingly becomes recognised as a disease affecting older adults in developed nations. Rather than positioning the ageing HIV-population as a potential burden, it is proposed that learning more about the coping mechanisms employed by older adults with HIV could prove beneficial for the HIV-population as a whole.

Client engagement is an important part of contemporary aged care. However, the extent to which decisions are delegated to the older person, and the scope of issues about which decision making occurs, vary. The types of engagement that are offered to, and taken up by, aged-care clients have implications for the extent of power and influence older people hold. This paper reports on a qualitative study conducted in a large Australian service provider. It identifies the forms that client engagement takes in the aged-care context, the roles for staff and older people that are enacted through these activities, and the implications these have for power relationships and older people's influence. An inverse relationship was seen between the depth and scope of client influence, but a desire to address this suggested potential spaces for greater empowerment. A relationship was evident between the retention of control by staff and the perceived effectiveness of existing engagement strategies, highlighting the limitations of traditional power dynamics in engagement practice. An expanded model of engagement in aged care is proposed that recognises the foundational role of connection building as a facilitator of greater empowerment for older people. Implications for theory regarding engagement in aged care, and the practice of engagement in aged-care organisations, are discussed.

Environments need to be designed such that they support successful orientation for older adults and those with dementia who often experience marked difficulties in their orientation abilities. To better understand how environments can compensate for decreasing orientation skills, voice should be given directly to those experiencing dementia to describe how they find their way and to understand their design preferences. This study explored the navigational experiences and design preferences of older adults with memory difficulties living in a retirement development. In-depth semi-structured interviews with 13 older adults experiencing memory difficulties were conducted. All participants were residents of one retirement development in the United Kingdom. Questions began broadly, for example, to describe their experiences of navigating in their living environment, before discussing any specific navigation difficulties in detail. Thematic analysis identified three main themes: highlighting environmental design that causes disorientation, strategies to overcome disorientation, and residents’ suggestions to improve the design. The design suggestions were particularly informative, heavily focusing on the importance of having memorable and meaningful spaces which were favoured more than signage as an orientation aid. The findings demonstrate the need to consider environmental design to support orientation for those with memory difficulties. Of particular importance is the use of meaningful and relevant landmarks as orientation aids which can additionally stimulate conversation and increase wellbeing. Given the range of suggestions in dementia-friendly design guidelines aimed to support orientation, it is crucial to speak directly to those living in different environments to learn how they find their way around and what design works in their environment.

Despite reported benefits of Telecare use for older adults, uptake of Telecare in the United Kingdom remains relatively low. Non-users of Telecare are an under-researched group in the Telecare field. We conducted 22 qualitative individual semi-structured interviews to explore the views and opinions of current non-users of Telecare regarding barriers and facilitators to its use, and explored considerations which may precede their decision to accept, or reject, Telecare. Framework analysis identified a number of themes which influence the outcome and timing of this decision, including peace of mind (for the individual and their family), the strength and composition of an individual's support network, the impact of changing personal and health circumstances, and lack of communication about Telecare (e.g. advertising). A cost–benefit decision process appears to take place for the potential user, whereby the benefit of peace of mind is weighed against perceived ‘costs’ of using Telecare. Telecare is often perceived as a last resort rather than a preventative measure. A number of barriers to Telecare use need to be addressed if individuals are to make fully informed decisions regarding their Telecare use, and to begin using Telecare at a time when it could provide them with optimal benefit. Although the study was set in England, the findings may be relevant for other countries where Telecare is used.

The benefits of meaningful activity in later life are well documented. Studies show that being occupied contributes to both physical and mental health as well as quality of life. Research also suggests that activity may be beneficial to people residing in care homes, including people living with dementia. This paper presents findings from a study which used the Adult Social Care Outcomes Toolkit (ASCOT) to measure quality of life in six care homes located in the south-east of England. The study found, like previous ones, that care home residents’ days were characterised by a lack of activity. Drawing on observations, interviews and focus groups with residents and staff from these homes, this paper attempts to understand why care home residents do not engage in meaningful activities. We reject the idea that these low levels of activity are a natural part of the ageing process or that they can be explained by notions of resident choice. Instead, the findings point to both insufficient funding and working practices within care homes as more substantive explanations. These explanations inform a discussion of how the low levels of engagement in meaningful activity could be addressed and residents’ quality of life improved.

This study examined engagement in leisure activities among older adults, specifically focusing on how life transition factors in later life, including retirement and marital status, are associated with leisure activity engagement using a national sample of older American men and women. We conducted multiple regression analyses with a sample of 5,405 individuals (2,318 men; 3,087 women) from the Consumption and Activities Mail Survey, a supplementary sample of the Health and Retirement Study. We analysed activity engagement in each of four domains of leisure activities: mental, physical, social and religious. Retirement status was categorised into three groups: working (referent), completely retired and partly retired. Marital status was categorised into four groups: married (referent), divorced or separated, widowed and never married. We found an overall trend of a positive relationship between retirement and leisure activity engagement, which suggests that retirement provides a chance for older adults to participate in leisure activities after withdrawal from the labour force. The overall trend of a negative relationship between non-married status and leisure activity engagement suggests that the loss or absence of a spouse may serve as a barrier to participate in leisure activities. Nevertheless, variation among retirees and non-married individuals suggests future studies should compare completely and partly retired individuals or those who are widowed, divorced or separated, or never married to elucidate distinguishable leisure activity profiles.

This study explores whether the plans of older workers on the cusp of retirement are in line with the active ageing agenda set by policy makers in Europe. The study was carried out in Italy, England, and the United States of America (USA). A total of 133 older workers who planned to retire within the next 10–12 months were interviewed (55 in England, 40 in Italy and 38 in the USA) between May 2014 and early 2015 using common semi-structured questions. Active Ageing Index dimensions were used to gauge the orientation of older people towards their retirement. The results of the study suggest that, with some differences, retirement plans of interviewees were substantially consistent with the active ageing perspective. However, some challenges were highlighted, including the need for governments to do more to promote genuine freedom of choice in relation to leaving the labour market, and to provide greater support for informal family carers. Findings also pointed to the need to measure active ageing in connection with individual wellbeing, e.g. by including indicators of leisure activities and by considering the re-weighting of employment and informal care dimensions. Companies could also provide more support during the retirement transition, with opportunities for maintained social connection with former colleagues, and help in making and fulfilling retirement plans.

In 2012/2013 the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing (ELSA) included a comprehensive Sexual Relationships and Activities Questionnaire (SRA-Q). A total of 7,079 men and women mainly aged 50 to >90, primarily heterosexual and in a coupled relationship, completed the SRA-Q, answering a series of questions about their attitudes to sexual relationships, their own sexual activities, problems and concerns with sexual functioning, and quality of intimate relationships. The questions aimed to gain insights into the ways in which sexual relations and activities related to health, wellbeing and other lifestyle factors change as people grow older. The primary mode of data collection was a tick box response to a series of questions. However, at the end of the questionnaire an open comment box was provided, which asked respondents whether there was anything else that they would like to say; 1,084 respondents provided additional information and these comments created a unique qualitative data-set. The analysis of the data then illustrated how people's health, relationships, experiences and perceptions of ageing, along with sexual satisfaction, impact on sexual relationships and activities.

This paper evaluates the effects of migration on life satisfaction in later life. We compare the life satisfaction of older migrants with that of non-migrants and return migrants of a similar age and originating from the same regions in Turkey. Turks constitute one of the largest migrant groups in Europe, and the growing population of older Turkish migrants display greater risks of loneliness and material disadvantage compared to native-born populations in Europe. However, compared to their non-migrant peers from the country of origin, older migrants may experience gains from migration that are reflected in their life satisfaction. Using the 2000 Families Study, a large survey of Turkish migrants from the peak labour migration period and their non-migrant comparators, we investigate whether life satisfaction of migrants and stayers differs and the possible causes of any differences. We find that both migrants and return migrants experience higher life satisfaction in old age than stayers. However, the gap cannot be explained by the classical determinants of life satisfaction such as income, health, partner and friends, or religiosity, nor by the better outcomes of the migrants’ children. We discuss possible reasons for this migration satisfaction advantage.